This invention relates to the art of telecommunications and more particularly to a system and method for routing a call in a telecommunications network using a called-party-preferred Long Distance Carrier.
Telecommunications systems enable a calling party to communicate with a called party by providing either circuit switched or packet-based connection between the calling party terminal and the called party terminal. When the distance between the terminals is great, a Long Distance Carrier having the facilities for routing calls over long distances is used to route the call.
Often times, the calling party has some choice in selecting the Long Distance Carrier. However, sometimes the called party must pay for the Long Distance Carrier to route calls to them. For example, many times when the called party is using a wireless terminal, also referred to as a cellular phone, to receive the incoming call the called party pays for the Long Distance Carrier to route the call to them. It is therefore, desirable for the called party to have the ability to select the Long Distance Carrier that will be used to route an incoming call to them.